Acer denies any plans to pull out of tablet market

By Lisa Wang / Staff Reporter

Acer Inc (宏碁) says it has no plans to halt its tablet operations, denying a media report saying that Acer would follow in the footsteps of Hewlitt-Packard Co and BlackBerry phone maker Research In Motion Ltd by retreating from the market dominated by Apple Inc.

The world’s fourth-biggest PC maker also said it has no plan to streamline its workforce, according to a press release yesterday.

“Acer will continue to develop and research tablet PCs and smartphone products. The company does not plan to exit these two markets, or layoff staff,” it said.

“Acer will invest rationally in the two product lines. By taking a simplified approach, we plan to reduce the number of models and focus on a select few,” it said.

The Chinese-language United Daily News said yesterday that Acer was scheduled to announce next month a plan that would include scraping a 300-staff touch-screen business group and cut 50 percent of the jobs at its tablet and smartphone divisions.

The paper said Acer would withdraw from the tablet market next year, citing an unspecified foreign institutional investor’s report.

“Acer’s touch-screen business group is dysfunctional, despite that the company said it is studying any adjustment,” a Digitimes’ research team said in an e-mailed report.

Digitimes expected Acer’s tablet shipments to fall 45 percent to about 1 million units next year, from 1.85 million this year.

Acer’s withdrawal from tablet market would mean a defeat in the fight with Apple for dominance.

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